Let's Go Home
by p-attinson
Summary: "John, listen to me, this is not a hallucination. This is real." John laughed sarcastically. "You're dead."


Sherlock Holmes stood on the sidewalk.

He thought of John all the time. Even when he was in America. You'd think being in such a busy country with so many things to do one with such intellect would be able to stop thinking even just for a split moment. But the truth was, John never stopped crossing his mind.

This has never happened before.

Through the window John was staring at the floor. He didn't even bother to look up at him or to anything around him. The pure agony on his face was almost disrespectful, considering the thing he mourned over was looking upon his face just a few inches away.

Sherlock wanted to knock on the window or to even make a sound but he kept all desires within. But how could John not see him?

Sherlock had been 'dead' for three years, now. He wondered if he had changed John. He wondered if he'd grown colder or continued to be soft. He wondered if he continued his life as a doctor or if he was onto other things. Had his tremor came back? Sherlock looked around a bit more thoroughly and saw it; the cane John sported when they first met leaning against the diner tabletop.

It was safe to say that John was probably an asshole, now.

Sherlock took a deep breath. He couldn't believe he was finally doing this and it didn't seem real at all; he imagined this scenario happening in so many ways with so many different venues but nothing was as epic as this…

A worn diner at twelve in the morning with day-old apple pie.

Sherlock entered the building and the atmosphere was warmer than the outside. In the November air everything was much cooler but as soon as he noticed he was breathing the same air as John the whole world became tepid.

Sherlock rung his hands together as he walked towards the table. Then he sat three stools from him, concentrating on what he would say. But Sherlock could _only_ say one thing; one familiar name that he had missed for so long.

"John." He barely whispered.

John didn't respond. He just continued to watch his feet below him.

Sherlock rolled his eyes. For heavens sake, had the man really continued to stay so unobservant?

"John." Sherlock said again, louder this time.

No reply.

However, John stood up with his gaze still at the ground. Sherlock watched as he passed him unknowingly. He was shocked…_offended_, even.

With a groan Sherlock threw back his head and sighed obnoxiously. "_John_!" Sherlock hollered.

John finally turned but slower than Sherlock had hoped.

A flash of hope glimmered John's green eyes; a flash that meant nothing to anyone else but Sherlock. This was a look of pure emotion that could caused so much chaos if taken so impersonal.

He looked ragged but well kept. Someone had been taking care of him. His hair had been tended to and his chin was a bit scruffy. John wasn't shaving now? Had London fell?

John just stared at him for the longest time, the cane in his right hand trembling against the grimy, tile.

"Sher…" he paused. Then he shook his head. "No."

He turned to walk _away_.

Sherlock lept from his seat and reached John outside, grabbed his shoulders, and shook him harshly. "John!"

"Go away…" John mumbled under his breath. "Go away. These should have gone away by now. Dear God, I need to change my prescription…" He rubbed a hand against his face.

Sherlock sighed. Then he took John's face in his rather large, leather gloved hands. "John, listen to me, this is not a hallucination. This is real."

John laughed sarcastically. "You're dead."

Sherlock shook his head. "No, John, I never was." He slapped his face lightly, shaking him again. "Can you feel that, John? Is that a ghost? Can a ghost_ touch_ you?"

John's expression slowly morphed into realization - maybe a bit of courage as well. Then he grabbed Sherlock's face and shoved him slightly.

"Is it really you?" John's eyes watered. His mouth trembled. His legs almost gave in like the clatter of his cane against the ground. "Is it really you, Sherlock?"

Sherlock nodded and smiled. "It's me, John. It's me."

John's wide eyes overflowed with water and dripped against the loose fabric of Sherlock's scarf.

"You bastard!" John said loudly, but clinging to him tightly. "You're alive, you bastard!"

Sherlock automatically retracted. "No, John! Listen to me!" He grabbed the collar of his coat. "It's complicated."

"Complicated?" John chuckled dramatically and Sherlock could see the strain on his eyes. "Complicated? That's complicated? What's _complicated_?" He pushed him up against the brick walls of the diner, long forgotten. "What's complicated is waking up every morning in that _dammed_ flat! What's complicated is walking past the Scotland Yard every morning on my way to work! What's _complicated, Sherlock Holmes_, is that my best friend had pretended to be dead for three whole _bloody_ years! That's what's _complicated_!"

Sherlock slumped his shoulders. "John, I'm sorry."

"You're sorry!?" John shouted. "_Sorry_?"

Sherlock felt like he couldn't breathe. "You don't think it hurt me as well?"

John smirked and inhaled. "There it is." He said.

"What?" Sherlock snapped.

"Sherlock Holmes feels remorse." He answered.

Sherlock raises an eyebrow. "Not remorse, John, pain. Believe it or not, I am capable."

A rather dark laugh from John. "Could of fooled me. What was this for then? An experiment? Or was it to show off your_fantastic_ skills?"

"Neither." Sherlock barked back.

"Then what?" John crossed his arms, completely ignoring the few bystanders that walk over his forgotten cane.

Sherlock sighs. "John, _let's go home_."


End file.
